Tubular Bells

Xi'an Travel Blog

We have been to Xi'an before, so this trip is an opportunity to see some less visited sites ie not the Terracotta Warriors, though I do succumb to buying a small army (12 soldiers to be precise) as potential gifts for friends in the UK. It is also the chance to chill out for a few days before heading to Bejiing.

We consider whether to visit the other royal tombs which are in the vicinity of Xi'an, but it is almost impossible to do this independently and they don't seem interesting enough to justify the high tour price. Instead we decide to see the local city sights and museums and to take our time.

We visit the Muslim quarter near the centre and the old Xi'an mosque. This is particularly unusual as it is built in a typical Chinese style and looks not unlike a Chinese temple, most unlike the arabian style mosques we are used to seeing. We also go for an evening tour of the Drum tower which today stands on the middle of a traffic roundabout right in the centre of the city. The lights are good and the museum interesting but we had hoped for a performance of bell ringing at 7pm and find that the last one is at 5pm, but we suspect that the later performance is at the Bell tower about 400 m away. Never mind there'll always be another chance.